


don't write yourself off yet

by plinys



Category: DC's Legends of Tomorrow (TV)
Genre: Episode Tag, F/F, Fix-It, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-23
Updated: 2018-03-23
Packaged: 2019-04-07 02:21:44
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,836
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14070762
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/plinys/pseuds/plinys
Summary: Gary may have mentioned he had a roommate, but didn't mention exactly who exactly that roommate was. Which leads to a half naked John Constantine running into an emotionally compromised Ava Sharpe the next morning.(An episode tag for "Necromancing the Stone")





	don't write yourself off yet

**Author's Note:**

> I joked on twitter about Ava and Gary being roommates and then this fic happened.

 

The thing is Gary had mentioned a roommate the night before.

Admittedly, it was a comment that John had ignored because it hadn't really seemed relevant at the time. A housemate that he shared the place with, someone who should be out and about for the night, a friend from work - nothing that seemed really important to John when he had much more important things on his mind. In fact, Nothing had seemed to matter at all with what came after, the need to get Gary on the nearest flat surface as quickly as possible.

He'd succeeded, and the night had been incredible.

John had even stuck around afterwards. Laid there in the afterglow thinking about how he wouldn't exactly be opposed to a round two, or three, or even something more  _stable_ than that.

Even though the thought of that still made John… Not nervous, not exactly, but something new, a feeling he wasn't entirely used to.

Not since...

Which was why when he had woken up that morning in a bedroom that wasn't his, with a man that had seemed somehow softer than ever in the morning light beside him, John had done the only rational thing and decided that he needed a smoke.

Which was why he was there, in the kitchen, sitting on the window ledge that led to the fire escape, making sure that any smoke was heading out the window rather than filling up the apartment, and letting himself get lost in his thoughts, when the aforementioned _roommate_ finally decided to make an appearance.

Slightly disgruntled, blonde hair messy and down, eyes red from sleeping, in flannel pajamas, with the same disapproving expression that she had worn all yesterday, hand fluttering to her waist reaching for a gun that was not there as she says - “What the hell are you doing here?”

Ava Sharpe.

Of course, she would be the dreaded roommate.

A part off him feels like he really should have seen this coming.

John grins at her - “Funny story about that-”

She doesn't give him a chance to explain, already crossing the kitchen in long angry strides, to where he is.

“What are you doing breaking into my apartment? What could _you_ possibly want from me?”

“Well, you see, pet-”

“And why are you naked?”

Again with the interrupting.

He stares at her, silently for a long moment, just for the dramatics of it all. He waits until eventually she gets awkward enough that she pointedly jerks her gaze away from him, the slightly hint of color on the edge of her cheeks, though annoyance seems to be her primary emotion.

“Technically not naked,” John points out, gesturing to the boxers he’s wearing. The only piece of clothing John had managed to put on before coming out here, and they weren't even his.

“Close enough,” she insists.

“And, in my defense,” John drawls, stubbing out his cigarette on the windowsill and letting it fall down to the street below, before slipping fully back into the kitchen. “I didn't know this was your apartment?”

“So you just go breaking into random people’s apartments,” Ava says, voice filled with distaste. “No, you know what, that's not surprising at all. This is breaking and entering, something which, Mr. Constantine, is considered a crime in most-”

“I was actually invited in.”

That seems to give her pause. Confusion fluttering over her features for a moment, before it seems to click, her expression twisting into mild disgust.

John winks at her to confirm her suspicions, and watches with amusement as her expression goes from mild disgust to extreme disgust.

“Get out!”

“Now, come on, pet-”

She ignores him. Twisting angrily away from the kitchen, and shouting “Gary!” loud enough that there's no way the other man could manage to sleep through it.

Even still John insists, “He’s sleeping. Wore him out last night,” he insists making the implications clear. “Speaking of which, shouldn't you be off celebrating with Miss Lance? Seeing as she's no longer a demon’s vessel?”

He’s not thinking about it. Doesn't know. How could he? But it's impossible to miss the effect the words have on her.

He had expected mild embarrassment or more annoyance, not Ava faltering in her step, losing all the fire that had been in her at once. That bravado and anger fading in a second and replaced with something less… Something smaller.

Something like sadness.

He can see it instantly, even though her back was to him, standing in the hallway and when she does turn back around, it all becomes more clear.

He had thought her eyes were red from sleep before, but now he can seem clearly, they were red from a night of crying.

From a night of - “Pet,” he prompts softer this time.

Her tears come suddenly, even as she scrubs at them to push them away, voice choked - “Captain Lance thought that I - that we -” Ava pauses rubbing at her face again. “She thought that it would be for the best if we no longer continued to have a relationship given the situation, and I-”

She's stopped from having to finish her sentence as the door that she had been about to bang on opens up.

Gary, having been awoken by her shouting his name moments before, stumbling out into the hallway.

He's wearing John’s shirt buttoned wrong, and John’s boxers, with hair sex rumpled and glasses askew. It's a good look. A look that makes John very much want to tug Gary back into that bedroom and take him apart inch by inch. To have a repeat session of last night.

Though that thought was temporarily put on hold.

Given the situation in front of them.

Or in front of him.

“Hey, Ava, I meant to text you, but I got distracted. And I know we have a rule about bringing people back to the apartment but I thought that you would be-” Gary starts off rambling as he does, but stops when he seems to realize what Ava’s expression means. “I - Oh.”

“Oh,” John echoes, pointedly and uncomfortably.

Right at the same moment that Ava abruptly shifts away from both of them insisting, “I need… Coffee,” and heading quickly back to the kitchen.

They both watch her walk away for a second.

John steps a bit closer to Gary. He would be all too happy to ignore the whole _Ava_ situation and pick back up where they left off last night, but he had a feeling that option wasn't going to be on the table for a while given the circumstances.

Still, he has to try - “About last night-”

“What did you say to her,” Gary says, cutting him off (because apparently that was a thing with Time Bureau agents) looking defensive of his friend.

And god, John really needed to stop finding everything that he did adorable. It was becoming a problem. One that John had a feeling was going to get him into trouble in the future.

Especially when the little scowl on Gary’s face just made John want to kiss him. He wasn't used to falling for someone so fast. One night stands- that was John’s usual speed- but this was… complicated.

But there would be time for his own internal crisis later. Instead, for now, there was a scowling Gary watching him.

John shrugs a little - “She was like that when I found her.”

Gary’s expression pitches down into a frown. “Not _her_ her, I mean, _her._ ”

This time it was John’s turn to look confused. “You're not making any sense, love.”

“Captain Lance,” he prompts.

And _oh_ , suddenly the realization clicks for him too. The conversation he had with Sara in her office. Right before he has asked Gary what exactly Time Bureau agents did for fun.

A conversation in which John had pointedly told Sara _not_ to do the thing that she had very clearly did.

“I can fix this,” he insists, “Probably.”

That relief, that hint of hope, John wasn't used to people looking at him with hope, even if it was over something that seemed so small in the grand scheme of things.

“I'm going to go talk to Ava, she's probably breaking the coffee machine out of pure spite,” Gary says, though he makes no actual motion to shift away from John. In fact he steps slightly closer into his space, eyes flicking down for a moment over John’s still mostly naked body before his eyes dart back up, a sharp hint of blush in his cheeks. “You should - You should get dressed.”

“Only if you promise to help me get undressed later, squire,” he says with a teasing tone.

The blush deepens, before the other man moves forward and kisses John, not with the passion of the night before, but a hint of something close to it. A promise for more and later once they sorted this all out. Though his boldness seems to slip back when the kiss breaks, and his voice shakes a little over the word, “Later,” before he's off down the hall to the kitchen.

John does as he's told. Going back into Gary’s room. He takes the white button down shirt off the floor that is not his, too finely pressed to have ever belonged to John, as well as the rest of his clothing. Putting himself back together quickly enough.

It's only once he's fully dressed that he pauses. His eyes settling on Gary’s phone on his bedside table. John really does need to invest in one of those at some point. Though for now he just grabs Gary’s phone, slipping it into the pocket of his trench coat.

When he makes it back out into the kitchen finally, he catches the tail end of Ava’s teary explanation. Something about Sara thinking that was too damaged for happiness and that the only way to handle this was to break up with Ava. A lot of shit in John’s opinion, excuses he had used himself when he thought that he didn't deserve happiness.

But he did.

They both did.

They _all_ did.

And this wasn't happiness.

“I need a smoke,” John says, jerking his gaze between the two of them, when she's finished.

Gary frowns a little again. But he doesn't openly protest, just goes to busy himself with the coffee pot again. Pouring out mugs for him and Ava.

He notices Ava’s still teary eyes dart toward the fire escape for a second, the one that John had been sitting out on earlier. Maybe thirty minutes ago, though it felt like _hours,_ if not _ages,_ now.

“I'll go outside properly, pet, don't worry. Just one of you promise to buzz me back in when I’m finished, yeah?”

If he hadn't already known something was wrong. Ava’s uncharacteristic nod at that would've been more than enough of an indicator.

He leaves the two of them to their conversation. Slipping on his shoes and heading out of the apartment, to have a much needed conversation of his own.

He makes it as far as the steps in front of their apartment building, settling down on the second to last one, before digging out Gary’s phone instead of his own lighter.

John had watched Gary punch in the code last night, so it's easy enough to do the same, and scroll through his contacts until reaching the one labeled _The Waverider._ It wasn't a direct line to Sara, rather to that grumpy AI of hers, but it would have to do.

It takes one ring before a voice that he thinks was programmed to be pleasant picks up with - “Good morning, Agent Green, regrettably I’ve been asked to screen all calls from the Time Bureau until further notice.”

“It's John actually, love.”

“Ah,” the AI replies, her faux pleasant tone dropping instantly. “Mr. Constantine then.”

“Could you connect me Miss Lance?”

“The Captain has asked not to be disturbed.”

John grumbles, of course she has, “You and I both know why that is, so let's cut the bullshit, and you just connect me to-” There’s a dial tone, and for a second he’s think she’s disconnected her which is why he’s caught hissing “Bloody bot” under his breath just before the line connects.

He hears Sara in a voice tight and reminiscent of the worn down tone of the woman he’d left upstairs, saying, “Do you have news about Mallus?” He imagines that she looks about the same as well.

Messes the both of them.

“Not about that demon of yours.”

Sara sighs. “Then what can I help you with John?”

“It’s not me you can be helping, love,”  John says with a drawl. “You know I told you not to do one thing, and you went and did that exact thing. This isn’t even the first time this has happened.”

It takes Sara a second. A small noise of confusion from her, before a shaky breath of air crosses the line, a small tremble to her voice as she says, “You mean, Ava?”

“That’d be the one,” John confirms. “I told you not to hurt her, didn’t I?”

“Well, yeah,” Sara says, regret tinging her tone, before she insists, “But better to hurt a little now than a lot in the long run. I’m damaged - _we’re damaged_ \- people like us don’t get to be happy and love people with light in their eyes. It’s not fair to them, it’s not fair-”

“And this is,” he prompts, a question in his words, “That teary eyed woman upstairs, that’s fair?”

“Ava deserves better.”

“Yeah, well, I deserve to get laid, but we’ve both drawn the short straw today, haven’t we, love?”

“What?”

“Long story,” John says, waving it off. “The point is, I’m damaged too. That’s not going to stop me from going after something good, and it sure as hell shouldn’t stop you, when you’ve got less blood on your hands.”

“I’m not sure that I-”

“Are you happy,” John asks, cutting her off before they can get into a debate over who has a messier history. Who is more responsible for bringing pain and suffering into this world. “Do you feel happy right now? That this was a good decision? Because if so, love, I’ll go back upstairs and tell them this was probably on me and let her yell it out, but if not, if you want a chance to take this back then-”

“I don’t think I can,” Sara says, cutting him off. Her voice soft enough that for a second she doesn’t sound like Sara Lance at all. “It’s too late.”

“It’s not,” John insists. “You come here right, and you can still fix this. Believe me, that woman is still madly in love with you, hurting because of it, don’t let her hurt forever.”

He doesn’t wait for her reply, he’s said his piece. He just hangs up the phone before tucking it back into his pocket, and leaving himself for a moment alone with his own thoughts.

His advice to Sara from yesterday and today wasn’t so far from his advice to himself.

Maybe happiness wasn’t so much of a far fetched dream for either of them.

Maybe there was a chance.

Maybe he really could...

John reaches into his pocket or his box of cigarettes, but never pulls one out of the box. Just runs his thumb over the top of the box once, then twice, in quiet contemplation before muttering “Fucking hell,” under his breath and shoving the box back into his pocket.

He takes the steps up back to the front door, pressing down on the buzzer, and waiting a moment before the door buzzes open, with an answer of his own. From there he takes the stairs two at a time until he’s made it back to the third floor apartment as quickly as possible, sliding back in the open door that he had left not long before.

They’ve moved from the kitchen.

Or well, Ava has. She’s shifted onto the couch, long legs bundled up under a blanket with a crossword in her lap, eyes still rimmed with red searching the page not seeming to make any actual effort to solve the puzzle, just looking for the distraction.

He knows the feeling.

Though he usually spent his time lost in the bottle, or the drag of a cigarette, or an ancient text rather than the domesticity of a newspaper.

She gives him a look when he steps into the room. That mild distaste from before, a little weaker than it was earlier, but back. It’s an expression that John can handle. Much better than the weepy look from moments before.

“Gary’s getting changed.”

“Then, I should probably give him his shirt back,” John says. Winking at her. Just because he knows it will give her an excuse to focus her attention on disapproving of him.

It works, as expected.

“Remind me to give you a proper shovel talk in a few days,” Ava says, voice stubbornly set, “Assuming you stick around long enough for that?”

“I think I-,” John pauses. He still wasn’t sure, but he had a feeling that he wanted to try sticking around longer. And taking the advice that he’d given to Sara felt like the right thing to do. “I’ll do that, pet.”

She wrinkles her nose a little at the pet name. “You can just call me Director Sharpe, Mr. Constantine, or I guess, Ava if you’re planning on making your presence here a frequent thing.”

“Ah, but where’s the fun in that.”

He gets a small smile for a moment that shifts back to a disapproving look, a moment later, before he gives her a mock salute and turns down the hallway of an apartment that was beginning to feel familiar. Even though he had just been snuck in there the night before.

John knocks once before letting himself into Gary’s room, more as a courtesy than actually asking for an invitation. A bright sunshine of a grin greets him when he opens the door and steps inside. Half dressed, a pair of casual jeans tugged up over his legs, shirtless for a moment, hair still messy and sex tossled, smiling wide at John - it’s a good look. A look that John very much appreciates.

“Good morning,” Gary says, voice a soft rush. “I forgot to say good morning before, which I should have, and I should thank you for last night, it was really good. Better than good actually, I…”

Gary trails off, falling silent when John steps into his space, looping his fingers through the belt loops on Gary’s jeans to tug him in closer.

A space that the other man happily occupies, the laugh on his lips only slightly nervous.

“Good morning,” John echoes, pointedly rubbing his thumb over the space where the top of Gary’s jeans meet his bare skin. Watching as the other man shivers slightly under his touch, pressing closer, clear in his own want and interest. John would give into that, wanted to so easily, if he wasn’t sure that they were about to be interrupted all too soon by the sound of the buzzer again.

At least, hopefully.

So he keeps the kiss that he presses to Gary’s lips mostly chaste, and tries not to let himself get too caught up in that look of wonder that still manages to find its way onto the other man’s face the second they break apart.

“I think I’m wearing your shirt, love,” John says.

“It looks good on you,” Gary insists, his throat bobbing as he swallows, eyes a little darker than they were moments before. “I - I have others, and I don’t really need that one back. Actually, when was the last time you washed yours? You know, we have a laundry machine and if you wanted to make a day of it we could do your laundry or-”

“God, you’re adorable,” John says, unable to stop the words from slipping out.

Not really wanting to.

Not when he gets Gary flushed again in front of him, shifting slightly so that John can feels the press of him through his trousers. Feel his want and interest clear as day.

“That’s not a bad thing?”

“It’s not.”

“No, in fact-”

John stops. The shrill buzz filling the apartment. About as long as he had expected for Sara to finally get herself together.

Gary casts a look at him, arching an eyebrow in his direction.

John doesn’t answer him. Not exactly. Just pulls Gary’s phone from the pocket of his trenchcoat, handing it back with a little shrug.

“Did you-”

“Put a shirt on, love, and let’s go see.”

Gary does as instructed, with only a little reluctance, slipping away from John to grab a t-shirt from one of his dressers. Before following John back out into the center of the apartment. They make it just in time, to catch Ava opening the front door. Freezing a little at the sight of the person on the other side.

Sara looks about as good as John had imagined she would.

The regret clear in her features.

Neither of them had been taking this well, something which John had known, but also something that was all too clear now that it was right in front of him. As if there had ever been any doubt.

“You did,” Gary says, just a small whisper, just meant for him. A sort of revenant and thankful tone that John is hardly sure he deserves, since depending on the point of view, this whole situation was also kind of his fault.

But still…

Happiness.

They all deserved a chance at that.

“I’m the biggest idiot in the world,” Sara says, announces really to the gathered group of them. She catches John’s gaze for just a moment, a stubborn set to her face, and he knows that Sara can take it from here. That there wasn’t anything to worry about anymore. Before she turns her gaze back to the woman directly in front of her. “I’ve made a huge mistake, and I’ll be lucky if you even want to hear me out.”

Ava’s voice is tight, a little pained, but not entirely unwelcoming, as she replies, “No shit.”

And yeah, they’ve got it from here.

Both of them.

“Why don’t we get out of here, and leave these two ladies to sort out their problems,” John offers. A little loud for a whisper, but one that gets Gary’s attention.

“Do you still have that apartment in New York,” Gary asks, eagerly, “Because I’ve got my Time Courier back in my room, and while _technically_ that could be considered a breach of Time Bureau protocol I’m sure that the _Director_ wouldn’t mind given the circumstances.”

Now that sounded like a plan.

He barely stops himself from saying _fucking finally_.

Instead, shoots Gary one of his patented mischievous John Constantine grins and says, “You know, love, I like the way you think.”


End file.
